Ideomotor and the ouija board

[blue sock monkey]

Perhaps people who have highly "trained" ideomotor responses are akin to skilled athletes. Instincts develop. A really good baseball player, for instance, does not necessarily consciously reason out his next moves--just responds rapidly by speeding to the right spot, catching the ball, and throwing it in the right direction with the correct amount of force and precision. The force and precision have become intuitive through practice.

 

[mbush1us]

Guys! He said in his OP that he knows it's just ideomotor. That means he knew at the start this sort of thing would produce nothing. What he's probing with the Ouija board is what his subconcious does through the ideomotor effect.

Telling him that there is no supernatual component and providing protocols to eliminate the ideomotor effect is not useful for his case.

I'm actually a she, but thanks. That's been my problem with the whole blindfold thing. I know it won't work and I've never suggested it would since I've already tried it. I can't figure out how a blindfold would produce any kind of information with regards to the subconscious based on the complexity of the responses I get. If the responses were the simplistic ones that seemed to be assumed or I was making some kind of paranormal claim then yeah, it would tell me something. However, in my mind any experiments should take into account what is actually happening in order to be effective.

 

[mbush1us]

Perhaps people who have highly "trained" ideomotor responses are akin to skilled athletes. Instincts develop. A really good baseball player, for instance, does not necessarily consciously reason out his next moves--just responds rapidly by speeding to the right spot, catching the ball, and throwing it in the right direction with the correct amount of force and precision. The force and precision have become intuitive through practice.

I have no doubt that this has a LOT to do with it and it probably also explains why believers are really good at it too.

 

[mbush1us]

Just some final thoughts before I have to walk away from the computer for awhile. I know that all I can offer is anecdotal at best and I don't expect it to mean anything to anyone. I've been thinking about the whole idea of the ouija board itself and its limitations with regards to it providing evidence or lack thereof to anything outside of the paranormal. While it is fairly simple to prove that it is NOT paranormal in nature - just ask for clear, specific facts outside of the user's knowledge and/or the blindfold test and it will fail. Convincing the true believer that this is in fact proof of failure is the tough part.

However, if I were to sit down with a group of skeptics (which I'm always more than happy to do) and demonstrate the effect that I personally get it would prove nothing at all about how or what part of my mind is doing the confabulation or even the extent of the confabulation to any skeptics satisfaction (nor should it). I could just as easily be fully consciously moving the planchette anywhere I wanted to and be accused of some ulterior motive (fair enough given that this probably happens all the time). If it could be (or already has been) proven that the basic ideomotor response comes from somewhere else in the brain than a conscious movement does and that difference can be shown on an FMRI then at least the effect itself could be shown to be unconscious and not willful. Perhaps there is a test where the amount of or kind of pressure on te planchette can be shown to be different - although I don't know if this is actually the case or just a self-delusional perception. I'm still not sure that would tell you anything about what specific part of the mind the responses are coming from or why those particular responses were given. I would be interested to see if the simplistic ideomotor effect and the more complex ones register in the same place or not in an FMRI or if the confabulations come from the same area as other types of confabulations as those experienced by stroke victims for instance.

 

[Almo]

I'm actually a she, but thanks.

Woops, sorry. Couldn't tell by the nickname.

 

[Pixel42]

Perhaps people who have highly "trained" ideomotor responses are akin to skilled athletes.

Or skilled sight readers of music. Or skilled simultaneous translaters.

There are many examples of the brain processing information and operating muscles in response without the intervention of the conscious mind, and usually far faster than the conscious mind could do it.

 

[ThatSoundAgain]

Indeed.

I don't know how much sway the four stage model of learning holds nowadays, but it basically argues that to be really good at anything, you need to practice it enough to get conscious concentration out of the loop.

Which rings true with me in a common-sense, practical way. Am I wrong to agree with this?

 

[Lanzy]

Trying automatic wrting is a good idea.

Also try other things, a cocktail glass on a smooth table? I've seen this at parties, two objects can be used for yes or no.
Blindfolding might also work, just say out loud what you "think" it is pointing to.

But personally I think you are actually moving this consciously, the speed you are describing seems contradictory to ideomotor effects.

 

[mbush1us]

I just wanted to thank everyone who responded. I think the thread's life is over at this point since there seems to be a disconnect on what I'm really curious about and suggesting with regards to interacting with true believers on this one small belief. While the suggestions for blindfolded tests and the like are totally justified as they are no doubt useful for any believers reading the thread they are a bit off the mark in my case and I'm not sure what more I could gain from redoing them. It's also likely that I'm not getting a perfectly valid point and I apologize for that. I think I would be wasting everyone's time to continue the discussion any further for my sake. Since any real insight about which part of my mind produces the effect probably requires actual neurological testing which is hardly an appropriate use of resources I think I'll just consider it a practiced subconscious ideomotor response with some conscious self-delusion thrown into the mix. Again thanks for the input I did appreciate it all.